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He turned his attention to Dalgarno, surprised how much he dreaded what he would find. And the search itself was not easy. Dalgarno was a man who seemed to do a great many things alone. It was not difficult to establish what time he had left the offices of Baltimore and Sons. A few enquiries of the desk elicited that information, but it was of little use. Dalgarno had left at six o’clock, five hours before Baltimore had been picked up by a hansom and taken to the corner of the Gray’s Inn Road.
A newsboy had seen someone who was almost certainly Dalgarno go into the Baltimore house, and half an hour later Jarvis Baltimore go in also, but he had left the street before eight, and no one that Monk could question knew anything further. The Baltimore servants would know, but he had no authority to speak to them and could think of no excuse. Even if he could have, Baltimore could have been killed at any time after midnight and before dawn. No enquiry showed one way or the other whether Dalgarno had been in his rooms all night. Exit and entry were easy, and there was no postman or other servant to see.
He spoke to the gingerbread seller on the corner fifty yards away, a small, spare man who looked as if he could profit from a thick slice of his own wares and a hot cup of tea. He had seen Dalgarno returning home at about half past nine in the evening of Baltimore’s death. Dalgarno had been walking rapidly, his face set in a mask of fury, his hat jammed hard on his head, and he had passed without a word. However, the gingerbread seller had packed up shortly after that and gone home, so he had no idea whether Dalgarno had gone out again or not.
The constable on night duty might know. He patrolled this way now and then. But he gave Monk a lopsided grin and half a wink. He did have a certain acquaintance who frequented these streets on less-open business; give him a few days and he would make enquiries.
Monk gave him half a crown, and promised him another seven to make up a sovereign, if he would do as he suggested. Only Monk would need more than a word secondhand; if there were anything, he must speak to the witness himself. What anybody else’s business was in the street would remain unknown, and unquestioned.
The constable thought for a moment or two, then agreed. Monk thanked him, said he would be back in three or four days, and took his leave.
It was about three in the afternoon, cold and gusty, gray with coming rain. He could do no more about Dalgarno and Baltimore’s death for now. It was probably exactly what it looked to be, and everyone assumed. He could no longer put off the search he had known from the beginning he would have to make. He must go back to Arrol Dundas’s trial and see if the details would shake loose his memory at last, and he could remember what he had known then, the fraud, how it was discovered, and above all his own part in it.
He did not know where the trial had been, but all deaths were recorded and the files held here in London. He knew sufficient details to find the file, and it would tell him the place. He would go back there tonight and face his own past, pry open the lid of his nightmares and let them loose.
First he must go home, wash, eat, change his clothes, and pack a case, ready to go wherever it proved to be.
He had expected Hester to be out, either working at the house in Coldbath Square or raising more money to pay the rent and keep it supplied with food and medicines. He presumed it because he wished it so, to avoid the confrontation of his own emotions. He was aware that it was a kind of cowardice, and was ashamed of it, but he imagined what her feelings would be if she were forced to face the truth that he was so much less than she believed, and that was a pain he was not ready for. It would be so violent as to disable the concentration and intelligence he must bring to bear if he was to keep his promise to Katrina Harcus and prevent any new rail disaster.
Even that was an evasion. It was for himself that he would do it. It was his own compulsion never to allow such a thing to happen again. He must do that before he could bear to face the original which lay somewhere in his memory, fragmented, imperfect, but undeniable.
He opened the door and went inside, ready to do no more than change clothing, pack, have a cup of tea and a slice of bread with whatever cold meat he could find. He would leave a note for her to explain his absence. Instead he almost ran into her as she came out of the kitchen, smiling, ready to walk into his arms. But he saw the uncertainty in her eyes that told of her sensitivity to his aloneness, the withdrawal of the old honesty between them. She was hurt, and hiding it for his sake.
He hesitated, hating the lie and fearing the truth. It must only be seconds, less than that, or it was too long. He had to make the decision now! It was instinctive. He went forward and put his arms around her, holding her too closely, feeling her body yield and cling onto him in return. This at least was honest. He had never loved her more, all that she was, the courage, the generosity of spirit, the fierceness to protect, and her own vulnerability which she thought so hidden, and which was in reality so obvious.
He pressed his cheek into the softness of her hair, moving his lips gently, but he did not speak. At least without words he had not deliberately misled her. In a moment or two he would tell her he was going away again, and perhaps even why, but for a while let it simply be the truth of touch, without complication. He would remember that afterwards, keep it in his mind, and deeper than that—in the unspoken memory of the body.
It was late when he reached the public records office. All he knew was the year of Dundas’s death, not the date. It could take him some time to find the record, since he was not certain of the place either. But at least it was an uncommon name. If he had still been with the police he would have demanded that the office remain open for him to search for as long as he required. As a private person he could ask nothing.
He simply requested the records section he wanted, and when he was conducted to it, sat on a high stool, straining his eyes to read the pages and pages of spidery writing.
The attendant was at his elbow to tell him they were closing when he saw the name Dundas, and then the rest of it: He had died of pneumonia in prison in Liverpool, April 1846.
He closed the book and turned to the man. “Thank you,” he said hoarsely. “That’s all I need. I’m obliged to you.” Irrational how seeing it in cold writing like that made it so much more real. It took it out of imagination and memory and into the world of indelible fact that the world knew as well as he.
He strode out of the door, down the steps and along the street back to the station, where he bought a ham sandwich and a cup of tea while he waited for the last train north.
When the night train pulled into Liverpool Lime Street just before dawn, Monk got off shivering cold, his body stiff, and went to buy himself a hot drink and something to eat, then to look for some sort of lodgings where he could wash and shave and put on a clean shirt before he began to look for the facts of the past.
It was still far too early to find any records office open, but he knew without asking where the prison was. By seven o’clock it was gray daylight with a stiff wind coming up off the Mersey. All around him people were hurrying to work, steps swift, heads down. He heard the flat, nasal Liverpool voices with the lift at the end of each sentence, the dry humor, the cheerful complaints about the weather, the government, the prices of everything, and found it all oddly familiar. Even the slang he understood. He took a hansom and simply directed the driver, street by street, until the dark walls towered over them and memories came surging back like the flood tide of the sea, the smell of the wet stones, the sound of rain in the gutter, the unevenness of the cobbles and the chill wind around the corners.
He told the driver to wait, climbed out, and stood staring at the locked gates. He had been here before so many times in Dundas’s last days, even the pattern of light and shadow on the walls was familiar.
More powerful than the blackness of the stone around him, and the smell of ingrained dirt and misery, was the old feeling of helplessness come back with shattering force, as if the air were thin in his lungs, starving him of breath.
He stood motionless, fighting to grasp something tangible—words, facts, details of anything—but the harder he tried the more completely it all eluded him. There was only the suffocating emotion.
Behind him, the cab horse shifted its weight, iron shoes loud on the cobbles, harness creaking.
There was nothing to be gained here. Remembered pain did not help. He had not doubted the truth of it. He needed something he could follow.
He walked slowly back to the hansom and climbed in.
“I want to look at old newspapers,” he told the driver. “Sixteen years ago. Take me wherever they are.”
“Library,” the driver replied. “Less yer want the law courts?”
“No, thank you. The library will do.” If he had to ask for a transcript of the trial he would, but he was not ready for that yet. To see such a thing he would have to give his name and his reasons. The newspapers were an anonymous way of learning, and he despised himself even as the thought was in his mind. Still, he knew it was self-preservation to guard against all the hurt he could. Pain was disabling, and he had to keep his promise to Katrina Harcus.
